Mac Wilkins finds his niche at Concordia

Former UO great Mac Wilkins, a four-time Olympian, and 1976 gold medalist in the discus, is now the throws coach at Concordia University in Portland, a tiny NAIA school.

In Thursday’s paper, we take a look at how Mac ended up at Concordia, and check in on the progress of the Concordia Throws Center, a unique training facility dedicated to the throws which he conceived and designed.

One of his athletes, Annie Hess, has already made the “B” standard for the Olympic Trials with a toss of 183-10 in the discus.

Elsewhere, the OTC Elite crew will send four guys to the Penn Relays. Nick Symmonds (1,200) and Christian Smith (1,600) will be on one team, while Kevin Hicks (1,200) and Sean O’Brien (1,600) are on another team.

The rest of the group will be at the Oregon Relays at Hayward Field on Friday and Saturday.

Curtis Anderson covered UO track and field for The Register-Guard from 1990-96, and again since 2005. He covered the 2012 Olympic Games in London, in addition to the U.S. Olympic Track & Field Trials in New Orleans (1992), Atlanta (1996) and Hayward Field (2008 and 2012). He is the winner of the Jesse Abramson Award, presented by the Track & Field Writers of America for excellence in coverage in 2008.